Qobuz

Had Spotify Changed to Tidal for a while. In October 2025 changed to Qobuz. Is Qobuz better? Yes... in some ways, but there are things to know. The BAD: Customer service: feels like it’s outsourced and under resourced or maybe they don’t care - any question you have they seem to brush over and give generic answers. I asked them where they have stated updates are coming (as in where online) the response “we have stated multiple times that we are working hard on updates” but didn’t tell me where they publish this info online. In one occasion they gave a basic reply, and then ignored my follow up question (it’s been a week and no reply) for this review I originally gave three stars, dropped it to two stars based on this. No folders: unlike Spotify you can't group music into folders. This is very bad, many people talking and complaining about it. Really impacts usability when you have multiple playlists and need to navigate. Search: You can't search a track across all your playlists, you have to be in the right playlist to find that track. This is not unlike other streaming services, but is annoying none the less. Less annoying than no folders. Example: I name playlists POP 2026 etc... and have years of these (POP 2025, POP 2024 etc) saved into the playlist when I discovered the song (ie. heard it first in 2024, it joins POP 2024). But you can't search for that great Kygo song across all playlists, you have to be in the playlist. I can't remember what year it was that every track I love came out :( Less available tracks generally: I used Soundiiz (separate service) to transfer music from Spotify to Qubuz, it was not great. Soundiiz missed heaps of tracks, replaced with weird versions, sometimes replaced with covers. So Soundiiz wasn't great... but perhaps this was because there are less available tracks on Qobuz than on some other services (it seems). Especially newer tracks that are perhaps not considered mainstream, which seem slow to get onto Qobuz. I have started making a list now on my phone of songs that I Shazam, that I then cannot add to Qubuz as it doesn't have them. Less dance mixes as well which is bad if you like dance music. See pics attached for track "A Bit Patchy (Eric Prydz Remix)" Qubuz can't find it - Spotify has it. The track came out in ... 2016? Costs slightly more (I'm paying $19.99 AUD pm). User created playlists: there are less of them (because less users) so less variety. Also “playlists” when using the app … there are some options to sort them, but you can’t manually sort by dragging and creating your own order. The default is they sort in the order they were created… so if you used a transfer service and the last playlist that service created as it moved your library over was some random playlist that you rarely listen to, that will be the playlist that always appears at the top of the stack of playlists. Yes you can sort them other ways, but it’s not great.

The GOOD: Sounds better than other services, options to stream higher bit-rate versions. Artists get more percentage payments from Qubuz vs most other streaming platforms. I feel better using it. But I'm using it less.

Verdict: I feel like I'm listening to music less using Qubuz. It is disappointing but I feel like my relationship with music has contracted. I'm relying more on loading actual tracks I own into my phone to hear them... Quboz feels more difficult to use, feel like it’s hard to search, and that it’s not as user friendly.

QOBUZ needs to add greater usability features such as folders, deliver a better search experience, and work harder to expand its track library as well as be faster to add tracks.

It is a good service, despite it's shortcomings. I've been a paid member for 2 months or so now, but I don't know how long I will continue. That will depend on what changes... hopefully there are some changes shortly.

QOBUZ is a french company, (stereotypes aside) I am hopeful that what seems like a dismissive attitude to user feedback (as evidenced by lots or reviews talking about how they don't have folders for a while now, and no improvement or resolution to this) isn't just a "FU take it or leave it", and we do see some changes to the service shortly.

A lot of work to move your music libraries over to have an average experience.

Feel free to contact me with a question if you are thinking of changing services.